Tuesday, December 23, 2014

Sporting KC Sign Tim Melia

Sporting Kansas City have their third goalkeeper, today announcing the signing of Tim Melia. Melia's name is a little familiar to Sporting KC as the goalkeeper spent time last year with Kansas City as a backup keeper when both Andy Gruenebaum and Eric Kronberg had gone down injured. He sat on the bench for three MLS games and traveled with the club to Nicaragua for the CONCACAF Champions League against Real Esteli during his time with the club.

He'd been with Chivas USA at the beginning of the season before being waived and later becoming a league keeper. Over his five year career in MLS, the 28 year old has made six league appearances, five of them starts. Two of them were this year, when he came on as a substitute after Dan Kennedy was red carded in a loss to San Jose. In the next game, Melia's first start of the season, he was sent off in the 67th minute himself as Chivas was down 3-0 to Houston.

Melia will likely compete with homegrown goalkeeper, Jon Kempin to be Luis Marin's backup this season for Sporting. My hope is that no matter how that battle finishes up, Melia is still the second keeper in the 18 for KC for most of the season. This would then free up Kempin to go on loan the entire year to Oklahoma City and start every game under Jimmy Nielsen. More than anything right now, Kempin needs games, and him sitting on the bench in KC backing up Marin isn't the best way to do that. If Kempin does beat out Melia for the second spot on the depth chart, then you can recall him if need be should Marin go down or get suspended.

The signings is a little surprising when it comes to the comments that Robb Heineman made in his #flyNtweet Q&A. Heineman was asked about the goalkeeping situation, to which he responded that two were on the way. As a follow up, he was asked if either one was from MLS. Heineman responded negatively to that comment. Considering that Melia wasn't technically with an MLS team at the end of the season, it's not totally inaccurate, but he was still an MLS goalkeeper and still on the league's payroll.